Lyrically Speaking: The rambled romance of ‘An Illustration of Loneliness’ by Courtney Barnett
No one does lyrical rambling quite like Courtney Barnett. Applying the slacker rock ethos to her words as well as her strums, lyrics tumble out of her mouth seemingly without thought or intention. Really, there’s a method to her meandering madness. In each shrugged-off phrase and each roundabout rumination, there lies real poetry and humanity.
This tendency to veil authentic feelings and thoughts with long-winded lyricism was evident from the moment Barnett unleashed her debut record, 2015’s Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit. The title alone reflected her penchant for accidental authenticities, which are littered throughout the record’s runtime.
One of the most striking examples of this comes just as you’ve settled into the world Sometimes I Sit and Think, with ‘An Illustration of Loneliness (Sleepless in New York)’. A sprawling yet sincere title hints at what’s to come when you hit play – lonely ramblings delivered straight from Barnett’s bedroom in the Big Apple.
“I lay awake at four, staring at the wall,” she starts, “counting all the cracks backwards in my best French.” It’s a stark and simple beginning, but the words come together with a certain bite. Barnett affords the cracks in the ceiling a little more meaning as she compares them to the lines in her hand, her words gathering momentum as she goes.
“I pretend the plaster is the skin on my palms and the cracks are representative of what is going on,” she sings, “I love a breath, my love-line seems intertwined with death.” Suddenly, the mundanity of the ceiling doesn’t seem quite so mundane anymore. It’s life and death, it’s palmistry, it’s everything. It’s the kind of misjudged importance we place upon things when we’re lying awake at 4am.
But as Barnett’s words wander between palmistry and poor handiwork, there’s one thing she can’t get out of her mind. As the first verse subsides, we get our first delivery of the line, “I’m thinking of you too.” Remember this – it’ll be important later. The instrumentation fades into a certain fuzziness before Barnett delves straight back into the strangest corners of her thoughts.
She debates the colour of the ceiling, deems oily residue “art-deco necromantic chic”, and wonders if her tummy might be starting to rumble. Her words are so specific to her, to this moment in time, but they still reflect that mindstate of accidentally finding yourself still awake in the depth of the night. It’s an environment that allows for those kind of rambling contemplations.
As if pulled out of her daze by hunger, Barnett leans back into the line, “I’m thinking of you too.” She repeats it over and over with a new sense of intention. While the verses are entirely dedicated to late-night thoughts that meander without cause, the simplicity of this refrain seems to reflect the calming, constant presence of her lover on her mind.
As she’s comparing the cracks above her to palmistry and debating the colour of the ceiling, she’s always brought back by the thought of her lover, she’s always thinking of them, “too”. If those other thoughts were attempts to fight off longings for her lover, they didn’t quite do their job.
Suddenly, her meandering thoughts fully give into this preoccupation as she wonders what they’re doing or what they’re listening to. Her thoughts are so tender – even asking what quarter of the moon they might be seeing from their own bedroom. There is no codependence or toxicity, only simple wonderings about where her lover might be right now.
Giving up on her directionless ramblings, Barnett closes the song with repeated declarations of thought for her lover. Each time she repeats the words, “I’m thinking of you too,” it feels like an attempt to feel closer to them. There’s a sense of mutual longing, too, in Barnett’s tacked-on “too.” She knows that her lover is thinking of her, and wants to reassure them that she is, too.
‘An Illustration of Loneliness (Sleepless in New York)’ may seem like a collage of incoherent ramblings on first listen, but it’s really one of the most poetic and romantic entries into Barnett’s catalogue. It’s a realistic portrait of what staying up until 4am will do to your mind and a contented statement of longing.
Listen to ‘An Illustration of Loneliness (Sleepless in New York)’ by Courtney Barnett below.
